Kevin Rothrock
Kevin RothrockTwo sources familiar with Trump's negotiations say Washington is working on a site for a Trump-Putin-Zelensky meeting as soon as the end of next week, but Ze says no such meeting should take place without the involvement of European leaders. Donald won't like that.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/zelenskyy-on-trump-putin-summit-talks-about-us-without-us-will-not-work-for-ukraine/
Kevin RothrockAxios source reports that Trump is still "pissed off" at Putin. "The general view for months is that we can bring down the Russian economy tomorrow. There are more ways to ruin Ukraine. But if he had to choose a side, he would start to bring down the Russian economy."
https://www.axios.com/2025/08/13/zelensky-trump-putin-summit-ukraine
Kevin RothrockWith the State Dept's Bureau of Intel & Research newly gutted, Washington's Russian experts won't likely be in the room when Trump meets Putin in Alaska. "It’s safe to say that Trump does not have a single policymaking person who knows Russia & Ukraine advising him,” says ex career diplomat Eric Rubin.
https://www.ft.com/content/89f39aea-30dd-4481-93c8-842576dff3fc
Kevin RothrockThough the White House had hoped to avoid the optics of hosting the Russian leader and his entourage on a U.S. military installation, the summit’s site will be Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, on the northern edge of Anchorage, babyyyy. https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/12/politics/trump-putin-meeting-plan-location
Kevin RothrockEurope now leads cumulative spending on weapons production for Ukraine, having procured more through new defense deals than the U.S., thanks to flat-lined aid under Trump. Also, there’s been a “clear shift away from drawing on arsenals toward industrial production.” https://www.ifw-kiel.de/publications/news/ukraine-support-tracker-europe-now-leading-spender-on-weapons-production-for-ukraine/
Kevin RothrockGood on Alexander Baunov for being a rare analyst who draws on Moscow’s explicit geopolitical agenda when writing about potential peace in Ukraine. The only interpretation of Putin’s aims that limits Kyiv’s territorial concessions is restoring Western recognition for Russia’s Great Power status.
https://carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/politika/2025/08/putin-trump-alaska-summit?lang=ru¢er=russia-eurasia
Baunov is the first to admit that this gets quite fuzzy/yucky in practice, and he acknowledges that Russia’s war in Ukraine may have metastasized to Moscow’s idea of recognition’s “material expression.” Still, it’s a sharp insight that Trump’s greatest bargaining chip is status recognition.
How recognition plays out in practice is messy, of course. A Russian sphere of influence, obviously, where Moscow enjoys the “right to set conditions.” E. Europe certainly won’t welcome such arrangements, but it’s probably not unattractive to someone like Trump.
Kevin Rothrockit always amazes me that this tweet is still there
Kevin RothrockIt’s a major failing by American liberals that they cling to pee-pee-tape dreams and Kremlin-stooge conspiracies instead of recognizing that Trump’s transactional approach to Putin is rooted in Russiagate-driven partisan priorities and now especially faith in Great Power influence spheres.
Kevin Rothrock“Zelensky directly linked the Russian offensive to the upcoming Trump-Putin talks in Alaska, saying it was aimed at shaping a narrative that ‘Russia is advancing while Ukraine is losing ground,’ in order to ‘put political pressure on Ukraine and seek some concessions.’”
https://www.ft.com/content/1a073378-3d16-44ea-a9e5-c57141260d80
Ze’s characterization implies that Russia really threw itself at Dobropillia to achieve this breakthrough, but reports describe small groups of men moving w/o equipment, “only with weapons in their hands,” ie Russia exploiting Ukrainian weaknesses, not a big gambit for political pressure in Alaska.
Kevin RothrockInvestigators uncover evidence that Russia is "at least partly responsible" (not clear what entity) for a recent hack of the computer sys that manages US federal court docs, ie highly sensitive records that could reveal sources and people charged with natsec crimes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/12/us/politics/russia-hack-federal-court-system.html?smid=nytcore-android-share